Physics Week in Review (Philae Edition): November 15, 2014

“The Philae has landed!” Excitement over the Rosetta mission has been building for weeks, with tons of explanatory blog posts on what the lander is meant to find, helpful historical timelines, and an Astronaut Simulating the Comet Landing while on board the Space Station.

For a peek inside mission control during the landing, check out this Nail-Biting, Funny, Frenetic Account in which planetary scientist Monica Grady shared her experience from inside the control room. Related: For Rosetta Mission's Scientists, the Thrill is in the Comet Chase. "Claudia Alexander has spent the last 15 years of her life waiting for this moment: landing a spacecraft the size of a washing machine on the surface of a speeding comet."

So much for comets. On the shameless self-promotion front, I have a new article up at Quanta on how Multiverse Collisions May Dot the Sky: Early in cosmic history, our universe may have bumped into another — a primordial clash that could have left traces in the Big Bang’s afterglow. (It's the second of a two-part series on the multiverse; here is Part 1 by Peter Byrne and Natalie Wolchover.) I also wrote a two-part post for NOVA's physics blog: There’s More Than One Way To Hunt For Gravitational Waves (Part 1 and Part 2). This week on Virtually Speaking Science, I chatted with Glen Whitman and Jim Dow about economic recovery after the zombie apocalypse, analyzing vampire investment strategies, illuminating the market forces that affect vampire-human romances. If you missed this fascinating conversation, it's archived here on Blog Talk Radio. And Jen-Luc Piquant highly recommends the collection of essays Whitman and Dow edited, Economics of the Undead: Zombies, Vampires, and the Dismal Science.

Time’s End Will Be the End of Endings. Or, when physics mirrors Doctor Who. Could time end? Yes. And no. Recent work in physics suggests a resolution to the paradox.

'Twisted light' beamed across Vienna. Portraits of Boltzmann, Schroedinger and Mozart were transmitted with an error rate of only 1.7%.

What does a journey through a wormhole actually look like? "As Interstellar physics guru, Kip Thorne, admits in his recently published book, The Science of Interstellar, the wormhole interior is an 'interpretation informed by simulations with my equations, but altered significantly to add artistic freshness.' Nevertheless he believes the visuals 'capture the spirit of a real wormhole trip' and are 'fresh and compelling.'"

Ancient pigments, modern mystery: When Chinese workers searching for water found the famous Terracotta Warriors instead, they brought to light a scientific mystery.

The underappreciated value of boring truths, with nifty plausibility/excitement graph. "If you’d break this down by research area you’d also find that the more boring the truth, the more people work on nonsense. Wouldn’t you too? And that’s why there is so much exciting nonsense in quantum gravity phenomenology - because the truth is boring indeed."

A Woman with the Key to the Secrets of the Universe, or why new CERN director Fabiola Gianotti is Teh Awesome. "Gianotti initially decided to study philosophy at university because it asked big questions, but in the end changed to physics because it was more likely to produce answers. This combination of artistic and scientific influences has left her with three passions in life: music, cooking and physics. “All three follow very precise rules,” she says. “Musical harmony is based on physical principles while in cooking, ingredients must be weighed out with precision. At the same time, you have to be able to invent because if one follows the same recipe all the time, you never create anything new.”

Shaking the Topological Cocktail of Success. Take ultracold potassium atoms, place a honeycomb lattice of laser beams on top of them and shake everything in a circular motion: this recipe enabled ETH researchers to implement an idea for a new class of materials first proposed in 1988 in their laboratory.

Wishing Doesn’t Make It So: What happens when science fiction runs into the cold, hard wall that is scientific reality?

Intangible Data in Physical Form. "Mathematical theorems, the physics of an object moving through space, and intangible scientific data are visualized three-dimensionally and made into works of art in these 12 sculptures and installations."

Bioacoustics: When Fish Shout. "Clownfish chirp and pop by gnashing their teeth together. Oyster toadfish hum and blare like foghorns by quickly contracting muscles attached to their swim bladders. Croaking gourami make their signature noise by snapping the tendons of their pectoral fins."

Cocktail Craftsmen Add a Dash of Science to the Mix. Pouring the perfect cocktail can be a serious business, with modern mixologists employing techniques that are more commonly found in a laboratory than behind a bar. Related: Japanese Distillery Demonstrates the Fiery Process of Charring a Whisky Aging Barrel. Also: Cocktail Calculus Chart: The Inner Workings Of Recipes. Understanding the interplay of acid, sugar, and alcohol gives essential insight into how a cocktail is structured.

Newsletter

Get smart. Sign up for our email newsletter.

Read More

Nobel Vintage: Physicist Brian Schmidt on Winemaking

Physics Week in Review: November 22, 2014

By Jennifer Ouellette on November 22, 2014

Every Issue. Every Year. 1845 - Present

Neuroscience. Evolution. Health. Chemistry. Physics. Technology.

Subscribe Now!Physics Week in Review (Philae Edition): November 15, 2014“The Philae has landed!” Excitement over the Rosetta mission has been building for weeks, with tons of explanatory blog posts on what the lander is meant to find, helpful historical timelines, and an Astronaut Simulating the Comet Landing while on board the Space Station.

Scientific American is part of Springer Nature, which owns or has commercial relations with thousands of scientific publications (many of them can be found at www.springernature.com/us). Scientific American maintains a strict policy of editorial independence in reporting developments in science to our readers.